This is the text of the keynote graduation speech given to the child and adolescent psychiatry residents at the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City on June 18, 2020. Let me begin by confessing that I am not a child psychiatrist. I am an adult psychia…
An excerpt from A Country Doctor Writes: CONDITIONS: Diseases and Other Life Circumstances. “Welcome back. How was your trip? Or exile … you were away for a long time.” “Almost a year,” my nine o’clock patient answered. A woman just over forty, s…
Even before the pandemic, the U.S. health care system needed a significant overhaul. For too long, we have operated in a reactive mode, prioritizing treating illness over ensuring health and wellness. In the post-COVID-19 era, stakes are even higher. O…
It is exciting to see so many American medical students join the protracted struggle for racial justice. Some students are involved in efforts within their institutions to affect change–both curricular and extracurricular. Others are working beyo…
“When the director of my general surgery program asked for a report on how the pandemic was affecting the residents, I queried my colleagues, promising anonymity to encourage candor. I received a wide variety of responses and reactions. Some are …
“Few physicians feel properly prepared to face the fear caused by this pandemic. I certainly did not. However, we continue to show up every day for our colleagues and our patients. We continue to focus on our jobs and the things that we can do to…
Four years ago, after a blissful fourth year of medical school filled with carefully chosen psychiatry electives and plenty of hikes in the mountains, I began my psychiatry residency program. I started on sixteen straight weeks of medicine, and I was t…
In April, I lost my dad to COVID-19, and this Father’s Day is going to be very difficult. As I was thinking about this, it occurred to me that there are many people out there suffering the same fate. Each death is not just a statistic. Each number r…
Despite major disparities that exist for African Americans in health outcomes and access to care, there is still an alarming lack of African American physicians in the field. This must be addressed with a concerted effort to recruit, admit, and train m…
While waiting for his mother to schedule his next well-child appointment, a young boy sat in our clinic lobby engrossed in his new Reach Out and Read book. He and his family were new to our area, having just moved from Syria a few short months before t…
